Earth is a planet born of fire.
For billions of years, volcanoes have helped create the world we know. From the continents to the air we breathe and even life itself, all have their origins in fire. These processes have created extraordinary...

Grab your mask and snorkel and come on an unforgettable adventure! Great Barrier Reef captures the natural beauty of the world’s largest living wonder and introduces us to the visionaries and citizen scientists who are helping us better understand this...

Join an immersive IMAX adventure to experience the life-saving superpowers and extraordinary bravery of some of the world's most amazing dogs. No stranger to superheroes himself, Chris Evans narrates this inspiring true story about remarkable (or is that...

The Fleet's newest exhibition, Pause|Play, is an invitation for the young and the young-at-heart to leave the digital world behind, hit pause on their busy lives and recapture the nostalgia of play. Science has shown that play has a number of cognitive,...

As Tim Gunn is fond of saying, “Make. It. Work!” And that’s the idea behind our Make-It Workshop, a creative and interactive workshop for innovators and other curious minds. We invite you to stop by Studio X (formerly Tinkering Studio) on Saturdays to...

Stay and play—and save!—until 10 p.m. on Friday nights this summer!
Bring the entire family to experience the Fleet at night! Enjoy extended evening hours at the Fleet in celebration of The Art of Summer in Balboa Park. Peruse Pause|Play late into...

Grownups! You get the science center all to yourself (no kids allowed!) to explore exhibits at a savings, enjoy an adult beverage and rock out to music on Saturday nights this summer.
Adult Recess provides your chance to take over the Fleet's...

The first Monday of every month, seniors 65 and better can enjoy the Science Center exhibits, a show in the Heikoff Giant Dome Theater and a lecture on the quietest day of the month for only $10! No coupons or additional discounts are accepted. The Fleet...

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Join us on the first Wednesday of each month at 7 p.m. or 8:15 p.m. for a tour of the solar system narrated by the Fleet’s astronomer. Journey through the cosmos with us as we explore a new topic each month.
For optimal viewing, each show is...

Join us on the second weekend of each month to investigate exciting science topics. Sessions will be filled with new challenges, hands-on activities and interaction with local scientists. Throughout the year, we will explore an array of fields including...

Gravitational Waves and Seeing the Light

By Dr. Lisa Will, Resident Astronomer at the Fleet Science Center.

Einstein Was Right

This week, scientists announced they had detected new gravitational waves. Albert Einstein predicted the existence of gravitational waves, ripples in the fabric of space-time, and he was proven correct when those waves were directly detected in 2015. Three physicists won the Nobel Prize in physics for that work.

So what makes these new waves so special? For the first time, astronomers were able to pinpoint the exact source of the gravitational waves.

How Are Gravitational Waves Detected?

Gravitational waves are detected by instruments called interferometers. There are two LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory) interferometers in the United States, and a new Virgo interferometer in Italy, all of which observed the waves. With three detections, scientists were able to triangulate the source emitting the gravitational waves.

What Made Waves?

On August 17, 2017, scientists observed a kilonova: a stellar explosion that occurs when two neutron stars merge together. This kilonova generated a burst of gamma rays and a gravitational wave. In the days and weeks that followed, a lot of light (electromagnetic radiation) was produced due to nuclear reactions in the material thrown off during the neutron star merger. In total, this kilonova was observed by over 70 observatories.

Previously, the only gravitational wave detections LIGO had made were generated by colliding black holes, which tend to swallow up the nearby material during their mergers and produce no light. This August 2017 kilonova was the first multi-wavelength observation of light associated with gravitational wave detection.

Scientific Implications

Thanks to the observations made of this kilonova, we now have:

Confirmation that gravitational waves and light waves both travel at the speed of light.